Why we need to be open to each other on the currency Mr Finance Minister

Zimbabwe in January 2009 adopted a basket of currencies as the official medium of exchange. Government business and transactions where done in United States dollars. Eventually the United States dollar became the official currency. The budget was done in United States dollars and everything started moving in the right direction. Shops that where now resembling empty warehouses started to fill up and to be apt Zimbabwe yanga yadzoka.

The government due to unfavorable economic policies enacted by the Mugabe regime that included the fifty plus one percent ownership of resources bled the country of meaningful investment. This coupled with a government with a great affinity of spending what it had not killed led to the shortage of the United States dollars.

Mugabe’s government after realizing that there where running short of the green back they introduced a surrogate currency in the form of the bond note. They instructed all the banks to have their Nostro accounts with the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe. The Reserve Bank itself which was broke and in debt after the quasifiscal shenanigans of Mr Gideon Gono had to be recapitalized and government had to adopt that debt as a sovereign debt. All this was well calculated to steal the people’s money from their banks. The reason was that the government was overspending and was acting as a mafia government which pretended to like the people yet it was destroying the people’s livelihood. Economists and even social commentators argued against bond coins and notes. Only those benefiting from the status quo argued in favour of the bond coin. Chinotimba and Chinamasa where the most notable of those advocating for the coins as a source of change. We had used the United States dollar since 2009 without the problem of change. The current president is also quoted in a video saying we can’t be seen buying mazhanje with real money meaning to say they knew as a government that they were about to deprive people of their hard earned money.

The current minister of finance, Mr Mthuli Ncube after being tipped of his current post he wrote a masterpiece on how he was going to remove the bond note and either adopt the rand or the United States dollar as the official currency of our country. Unfortunately for him he had not known that the country’s coffers where empty and Zimbabwe was broke. This actually dawned on him after he had made reckless statements on the bond and United States dollar rate that spiraled prices and led to our current situation. He had opened the Pandora box.

Mr Minister of Finance, can you elaborate why you have made people importing cars to pay duty using foreign currency if the rate is one is to one. What happened to the United states dollars that my tobacco brought into the country? Remember this year’s tobacco and gold racked in more money than any other years. My bank account that is funded by my tobacco crop is now a useless RTGS account. Can you really explain. I’m a lay man I need to be educated. My young brother Knowledge an artisinal miner whose gold is racking in United States dollars is still wallowing in poverty why? Why are we arresting those trading in foreign currency yet the country’s bank of last resort doesn’t have the foreign currency not even the bond notes.

It is because Mr Finance Minister you are Like that nak*d king in the fairy tales who was duped to believe he was wearing a specially designed suit yet he was nak*d. Zimbabwe is using bond notes Mr Minister and bond notes are not equivalent to United States dollars. Wake up and stop pretending that you are dressed. You are indeed lying through your teeth. Bond notes will never be equal to United States dollars. Unless you accept reality Zimbabwe will never be settled. It would become restless. It’s high time you swallow your pride and act like a real economist that you are. Bad money would eat away good money. The bond note is leading us into more shit. You are digging Zimbabwe’s future into a very big pit. We need a new dispensation that is both honest and Frank.

I rest my case and wait eagerly for your response.

henerimadiro@gmail.com

Henry Madiro is a concerned Zimbabwean citizen who writes about issues affecting the people especially the marginalized poor. He writes in his personal capacity.